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Page 7 West Vancouver Historical Society May 2004 Captain Vince remembered the time that he, Captain Smith, and Charlie Harris brought the old Doncella out of retirement, when the Sonrisa lay grounded and the No. 5 was sunk off Hollyburn wharf. They couldn’t get the light plant working, the clutch was frozen and a heavy fog lay over the harbor. They circled Burnaby shoal silently praying, while a CPR boat edged past them to berth. And Captain Lancaster recalled the old girl that spent all the trip in the ladies’ wash room, to avoid paying her fare. Which reminded Captain Smith of the trick they played on a smart young woman who ran the same gag. His mate stood at the washroom door while Captain Smith rang the “standby” warning to the engine room they were pulling into the wharf. Actually they were still a good mile away. As the charming woman stepped out of the washroom, the mate calmly asked for her ticket, and took five punches out of it, a conservative estimate of the number of free rides she had taken from the company. Harry Thompson was there, engineer on the first trip in 1909, and engineer on the last trip in 1947. Jovial and laughing, Harry bitterly criticized the decision that brought the end of the ferries. “These boats were never put on to make money,” he said, “they are a road to West Vancouver, and the most beautiful, scenic road in the world. You don’t expect Marine Drive to show a profit, do you?” Ex-reeve Syd Gisby was there with the top of the champagne bottle with with which he christened the No. 6, and exchanging reminiscences with the builder of the vessel, S. R. Wallace. Ex-reeve Joe Leyland was there, who saw the ferries reach their greatest hour in his term of office, and gradually fall away as the new bridge began to drain the traffic. Ex-reeve J. E. Sears was there, who saw the little vessels step nobly into the gap when rationing pushed buses and cars off the road in the war years. And many of the old passengers were there, that used to ride the ferries in “the horrible thirties,” with little mementos of their daily journeys back and forth across the inlet. Young Reeve Thomas J. Brown was there, with his council, symbolic of a changing world, and the well-loved thing that must bow to the march of progress. It was a laughing, but a sad crowd of people. After the boat had tied up when the round trip was completed, they hung around the wharf, reluctant to leave. LGT Feb 8th 1947 Don Thompson Stoker/Engineer/Entrepreneur Article by Jim Gerwing reprinted from the James Bay Beacon Ever wonder who started the Thompsons’ Foam Shops? Wonder no more. He lives right here in James Bay. Don Thompson and his wife Audrey formed the business as a result of his experience trying to buy foam for their boat. Although several companies on Vancouver Island sold some foam, no one had a complete line until they came along. The business prospered. Each week he would rent a truck to pick up his supplies on the mainland. They sold the business and retired in 1993. Engineering was Don’s first career. His grandfather had come to Vancouver from Ontario in 1910. A successful businessman, he served as the municipal engineer while a councilman in West Vancouver. Along with two partners he initiated the West Vancouver Municipal Ferry system. Don’s father was taken out of school at Grade 2 to work, but educated himself. He worked his way to a second class ticket as a diesel engineer, working for the West Vancouver Ferry Corporation and on tugs. Attracted by an offer of machinist apprenticeship, Don left school to work for Boeing until he discovered that it was simply a way for the company to get workers. He signed on as a deckhand on a tug and fell in love with the sea. He loved firing and oiling the big steam engines while working on steamers in coastal waters. He entered the Canadian Navy and saw 21 months of action in the North Atlantic as a stoker (firing and oiling the engines) on an escort vessel of the Algernine class. The “milk run” went from Halifax to New York and St. John’s. Not one of this class of vessels was sunk during his time at sea. After the war Don served on merchant ships, tankers, CPR passenger and freight vessels, always in the engine room. He holds a 4"' class marine steam engineer’s certificate. Then he took on stationary engineering in the forest industry, eventually spending many years selling sawmill machinery. The Vancouver branch of the World Ship Society bought, and Don helped restore, the “Master”, the only wooden- hulled steam tug in operating condition on the West Coast of North America. The “Master” has been at Classic Boat Festivals here in Victoria. By 1979 he’d had enough of that and with his wife opened Thompson’s Foam Shops, the first Vancouver Island Foam Shop to carry every conceivable kind and quality of foams, (Concluded overleaf)